When
Where
Title
Mueller Characterization for Partial Polarimetry
Abstract
Polarization carries information about the geometry, texture, and material of a light-matter interaction beyond what is available through purely radiometric measurements. This information is contained in the MM for a linear light-matter interaction. Characterizing the complete MM requires a minimum of 16 linearly independent polarization measurements, though more measurements are commonly performed for improved robustness to measurement noise. However, limiting the quantity of polarization measurements can reduce complexity, cost, time, and thereby make polarization information accessible to broader applications. This dissertation explores the utilization of a priori knowledge of the subset of MMs that will be measured in a given application for the purpose of designing effective partial polarimeters. This a priori information can come in the form of an initial MM characterization of the exact scene to be measured again later or as a more general representation of the polarized scattering response of a material.
The contributions of this doctoral research are enumerated below:
1. Optimization of polarization generator and analyzer states for maximizing contrast in polariscopic images of birefringent targets which is demonstrated on in vivo human eyes,
2. A method for efficiently acquiring and representing empirical MM data as a function of scattering geometry which requires 37% fewer goniometric measurements and stores 3 times fewer MMs per wavelength than the state-of-the-art,
3. An original polarized scattering model which both decouples depolarization and mixes first-surface with diffuse polarized reflection as a function of scattering geometry, with an average diattenuation orientation error of 10.9 degrees and magnitude error of 8.3% when compared to measured data, and
4. A partial polarimetric method for estimating depolarization magnitude and extrapolating MM, which resulted in an average error in depolarization magnitude of 7.6% and simulated polarimetric measurement error of 6.0% despite a 10x reduction in number of measurements.
These contributions represent different efforts to reduce some of the complexities of polarimetric imaging. Through these simplifications, insights from polarimetric information may be more easily accessed in a variety of applications.